Preliminary Review Of Foxborough's Fiscal Year 2013

The Foxborough Selectmen heard a preliminary presentation on fiscal year 2013 from Foxborough's Finance Director Randy Scollins, who presented a budget with a $750,000 deficit.

Scollins said this budget was created with input from the Board of Selectmen, the School Committee and the Advisory Committee, who were all in session at Tuesday’s meeting.

In a prepared calendar Scollins handed out to the audience and committees, he wrote that the fiscal year 2013, “budget documents requests will be prepared and distributed,” by Dec. 21, a public review will be held by the school committee for their budget on Jan. 30, 2012, and a public hearing on level funding, level service, or reduced services will be held on Feb. 7 by the School Committee and selectmen. Recommendations by the Advisory Committee will be given on April 26 and town meeting will be on May 14. 

Chair of the Board of Selectmen Larry Harrington noted that after the snowstorms last year, he was often asked why the town was consistently under budgets for the snow and ice removal.

Scollins said they are “consciously under budget”.  He said the town traditionally budgets $113,000 a year and goes approximately $345,000 above that. 

He explained, “If you raise snow and ice you can never reduce it,” and added that budgeting a higher amount will reduce re-imbursement at the state and federal level. 

Harrington also noted that the Patriots signed a contract with the University of Massachusetts to host at the stadium. He asked Scollins if they could budget for those events.

Scollins said the Gillette Stadium events are not a predictable form of revenue.  He said this past year Gillette has had the fewest events of recent years.  Town Manager Kevin Paicos said you cannot predict this kind of non-cyclical revenue for a cyclical budget. Scollins added that they should not depend on stadium revenue because he learned professional soccer will be moving away from Gillette within the next few years. 

Paicos said it would also endanger the town’s free cash wealth.  In fiscal year 2009 the town had $6.1 million in their free cash fund.  In the current fiscal year they have $3.6 million in free cash. Paicos said, “Foxborough enjoys good financial health. If we forecast event money we will lose free cash."

Scollins said he would like to curb the use of free cash each year to supplement the operating budget. Each budget season he will forecast less of its use.

Paicos noted there is, “not enough money for business as usual."  He said they have explored most of their budget cutting options last year, but they have three options this year to pursue. He explained they could explore new health insurance for the town, revenue from solar panels on the landfill and a more aggressive program on workman’s compensation. In the past, “claims trend has been poor,” he’s looking for a, “more favorable trend."